Union, school district agree on salad bars

Marty Ordman, front left, vice president of marketing and communications at Dole Food Co., attended a September event at Foothill Elementary School in Monterey, Calif. Salad bars were removed from 6 schools in the district in a union dispute over the hours required to service the salad bars. The salad bars will return after school and union officials reached an agreement.

Photo by File photo

School district and union officials in Monterey, Calif., have reached an agreement to return salad bars to schools following a labor dispute.

School officials removed the salad bars from six elementary schools in the Monterey Peninsula Unified School District in May, about a month before the school year ended. The local Classified School Employees Association said the salad bars required more time to service, and the 2.5 extra hours offered by the district was insufficient.

The new school year starts Aug. 7.

“There’s a deal,” Robert Cummings, the union’s Chapter 93 president, said July 18. “The new plan adds more hours to some of the bigger schools and a new person to do nothing but the salad bar. Some of the smaller schools will just add an hour here or there as needed.”

Implementation will be staggered through the school year, Cummings said.

Before negotiations resumed in July, district officials said they wanted the salad bars in place when the new school year started. The district plans to install them in all 11 elementary schools by year’s end. Secondary schools, which are undergoing lunchroom redesigns, are scheduled to receive salad bars the following year.

Dole Food Co. donated five salad bars to the district in September, part of a broader effort linked to the Let’s Moves Salad Bars to Schools campaign.